The Games Industry Is Riven!

I was considering digging out Riven this morning, to play it again after a considerable period since I first played it. If you haven't any idea what Riven is, then I shall tell you. It was the sequel to the highly successful Myst game. The game was a sort of point-and-click RPG adventure, but that description doesn't do it justice at all. They eventually made 5 games, all of which loosely followed on from the previous, however for me, Riven was the best. It just looked so damn good.

I've been having some gaming nostalgia this week. My son acquired Final Fantasy XII for his birthday last week and it's reminded me of just how good Final Fantasy VII was. That period (around 1997) must surely have been the pinaccle of games production, because all my favourites came out around then, not forgetting Tomb Raider II especially, with it's fantastic Venice levels. The best levels Lara ever traversed.

What's happened to games since then? I think it's the Internet that's to blame. The gaming industry have been pushing online gaming to the detriment of the games themselves. The three games I've mentioned above gave tremendous value for money. The gameplay lasted literally months (certainly if you had other stuff like work to fit in also). My son has finished many newer games in 2 or 3 hours and because he isn't going to be playing them online, it strikes me that he's being cheated out of valuable gametime, since so much of the disc is now devoted to that end.

Perhaps the new HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs will allow game creators to fully develop both elements, solo gameplay and online play without sacrificing either, although I just can't see it myself. I think the day of the massively long-lasting game is well and truly over. They will have gotten lazy now. Games used to take years in the making, but now they want quick releases with the result that the games need to be kept short and more emphasis placed on graphics and controls. It's npt too late though, let the thinking man back in so we can enjoy the beautiful looking, long lasting, intelligently created game, once again.

Dirty, Dirty, Dirty!

Well I gave the Russians a hard time the other day, was I wrong? They're now trying to claim most of Antartica in their continued drive to control swathes of the World's natural resouces, just like I said! But I don't want to seem as though I'm dealing in favouritism, so today I'll have a poke at the US. An article I read on an interview with Naom Chomsky yesterday, raised some specific questions in my mind, to which I doubt the answers will not become known before something terrible happens.

A particular section dealt with the reasons for going to War in Iraq. The reasons now are quite different, Al Quaeda are there now, although they weren't there before (Saddam was extremely paranoid and wouldn't tolerate any extremists) and it's dubious whether Al Quaeda really exist, given that the name translated from Arabic means "foreign toilet". Yeah, that's because they're so tough! Apparently some dodgy double agent, that even the Israelis wouldn't talk to, coined the name Al Quaeda, and the US greeted him with open arms, given what they knew was about to happen!

Anyhow, WMD's (Weapons of Mass Destruction) were the priority reason for attacking Iraq. Biological, Chemical or Nuclear weapons. But we all know that they never found any! Why was that? Well it was kind of embarassing at the time, but perhaps it was all part of the plan as Chomsky seemes to suggest. The only WMD's found in Iraq were in the hands of the UN Weapons Inspectors, being dismantled. These WMD's had been supplied to Saddam by the US , UK, France etc. However, on the eve of attack, all inspectors were ordered out by the US and the sites were abandoned!

Chomsky indicates that the sites were then systematically looted, primarily for nuclear material. Looted isn't really the word, as the process was ordered and methodical. The material is now in the hands of God knows who, but presumably dangerous people.

Given all the talk on Dirty Bombs, it would seem beyond foolish to allow easy access to the materials required, unless of course, the encouragement of International Terrorism was beneficial to you. The terror threat is on everyone's mind, but is there really a threat from terror, or is the real threat from those who fail to protect us from the threat of terror? Indeed, it seems that our governments are actively creating the atmosphere of terror. It seems plain that virtually every terrorist attack involves secret services at some point. They always say that the terrorists were under surveillance, but why should we believe that? Perhaps the secret services are providing assistance, to make sure attacks go ahead! Take a look again at the US. As some sensible person indicated, do Bush and Cheney look like they're bothered about being the most unpopular US leaders ever? No, they know that one single terrible terrorist attack could keep them in power forever. Elections cancelled and martial law in place! Would a dirty bomb do the trick? After all, they let "the terrorists" have just what they need to make one!

Golf Smorgasborg Of Ragnarok!

The beautiful vista you see before you is Cullen Golf Course, with its wonderful beach to the left, which has attracted so many visitors over the years. Probably the most memorable visitors to Cullen beach were the Vikings who landed there in 961 with a massive invasion force led by Eric of the Bloody Axe, with perhaps another Scandinavian King, Haakon! The Scots army must have been expecting them, but literally bumped into them (allegedly near Woodend Farm, now demolished). Anyway, the Vikings were firmly routed by the Scots, who drove them back to the cliffs (off to the left of this photo) as they tried in vain to reach the beach and their boats. Very few escaped. The victory however was soured, as the Scots King, Indulph, was mortally wounded and died shortly afterwards. The entire area for a few miles West of Cullen is dotted with Cairns. No doubt memorials to fallen Scots warriors. It is doubtful that the fallen Vikings received such venerable treatment.

On this day however, another battle was fought out near Cullen beach, as my son and I went head-to-head on the Golf Course there. I haven't played since before he was born (1994) and he has been playing steady this past year. So, it would be determined erm... if I could avoid being taught a humbling lesson, really!

The course turned out to be a little more demanding than it looked and I took a while to start finding my rythmn. Pleased to say I managed a par on one hole, but unfortunately for me the lack of practice took its toll... and I went down by 4 strokes!

Russian Bear Resurgent!

Saw quite a disturbing article this morning on the state of affairs in modern Russia. Apparently, Putin is engaging in numerous activities that suggest a general movement towards creating a fascist dictatorship, and that Democracy is being denounced while the Communist era is held up as time of great patriotism. Here are some of the most disturbing devlopments:

• The formation of ultra-patriotic youth movements who can be rallied quickly to demonstrate against political opposition.

• The encouragement of racial hatred, anti-semitism and a drive for a Russia for Russians. The large number of immigrants working in Russia are increasingly despised.

• Breeding programmes to increase the pure Russian population and help preserve the purity of the Russian race.

• Rampant homophobia including increasingly violent attacks on homosexuals.

• Organised book burning of works of "unpatriotic" fiction.

• The promotion of the belief that all political opposition is dangerous and anti-patriotic, indeed opposition members are branded traitors and Western symapthisers.

• Incentives for those willing to participate in the promotion of Nationalistic ideas, such as free University places for youth leaders.

• Heralding Stalin as a true patriot and hero of the Russian people while villifying Yeltsin (who brought Democracy to Russia) as a Western puppet and traitor to the Russian people.

Putin, when questioned about his policies, throws them back, by comparing them to the actions of the United States or Britain. He compared Stalin's Great Terror of 1937 (700,000 Russians murdered) to Hiroshima, and accuses Britain of having a "Colonial Mentality" for trying to gain the extradition of the man accused of murdering Alexander Litvinenko.

Of course, as you would expect, former Soviet occupied countries in Eastern Europe are becoming increasingly concerned by Putin's actions and words. He has already demonstrated his ability to make life difficult for some, by stopping the supply of Gas to certain countries and Russia is grabbing even greater natural resources, such as when they took control of gas fields near Sakhalin Island very recently. Just when people thought the Cold War was truly over, it looks like there could be a new, even more dangerous monster (bear) in the closet!

Phoenix Rising.... No, Falling!

Yesterday afternoon I took the family up to Moray Playhouse to watch Harry Potter and the Order Of the Phoenix. I was certain that this time it would be semi-worthwhile viewing, given that the previous films were severely disappointing and tended to follow the same plot each time, ie: Harry has a run in with his relatives, Harry goes to Hogwarts, wanders around a bit, there are some new teachers, Hagrid takes the kids into the woods to show them something. Then, they break for Christmas, Harry gets fed up, then its back to Hogwarts again, Voldemort appears, Harry accidentally saves the day, and its back on the Hogwarts Express!

So, how did the new film compare. Well this is a quick rundown on the plot:

Harry has a run in with his relatives, Harry goes to Hogwarts, wanders around a bit, there are some new teachers, Hagrid takes the kids into the woods to show them something. Then, they break for Christmas, Harry gets fed up, then its back to Hogwarts again, Voldemort appears, Harry accidentally saves the day, and its back on the Hogwarts Express!

Does that seem slighly familiar? Don't get to excited if you're a fan, because at least with the previous films there was a vague sense of direction. With this one, there was a complete lack of structure, the whole film seem disjointed and it just left me empty. Promotional trailers led me to believe that there would be massive battles, but in reality there was only a rather brief skirmish in which it wasn't at all clear what was happening, only Sirius Black seemed to die, except I don't think he did!

Would I recommend this film? Absolutley not! It clearly demonstrates just how poor film-making is today. I really think the proper art of film-making died in the early 80's. I can't say exactly where they're going wrong, but I suspect that aiming to squash a 900 page book into just over 2 hours screentime, means cutting out crucial plot elements, which is clearly the case with this film. I noticed the same thing with "The Two Towers" when it came out. It just seemed hurried, like they were trying to fit in too much, which they were! Not like the days of films such as Lawrence Of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago. The long drawn out dramatic scene would be a welcome relief nowadays. Even Spielberg with the Indiana Jones films, knew how to structure his films so the plotline was as clear as day. It's time Directors looked back at how it used to be done!

Top 10 Ways To Kiss Mankind Goodbye!

The slightly delayed, but highly anticipated follow-up to the Illuminati wanting to depopulate the World, post. This expands on the possible ways in which human life could be completely extinguished, but should clearly be taken with a pinch of salt, because to my knowledge, none of these are actually imminent!

In order of likelihood, but varying between possible and highly unlikely:

Top 10 ways to end all humankind

1. Pandemic
A lethal virus (man-made?) sweeps the globe destroying all of humanity. Scientists work around the clock to find a vaccine, but the virus is too complex and constantly mutates, it is also resistant to all antibiotics. The victims suffer excruciating deaths, while politicians and wealthy businessmen hide in bunkers to protect themselves, only to find they are already carrying the virus because it's that contagious and lies dormant for several days before demonstrating it's deadly capabilities.

2. Nuclear Holocaust
The Super Powers become caught up in some petty squabble which quickly escalates towards armed conflict. Nuclear strikes are launched in order to effect a rapid conclusion. Retalliatory strikes are also launched and major cities across the globe are reduced to rubble. This does not kill too many, however the radioactive fallout from the explosions will last for several years, poisoning all water supplies, livestock and vegetation. There is nothing to eat or drink and disease is rife. Billions die horribly, but maybe somewhere, some people can make it through!

3. Worlds In Collision
Velikovsky's theories about the frequency of inter-planetary collisions demonstrates itself to be true, to startling effect. A massive comet impacts the Earth at incredible speed. It probably impacts in an ocean, but no matter, the shockwave kills everyone, or if there are any survivors, the 3 year long nuclear winter that follows will finish them.

4. Pole Shift
Every so often we have a reversal in the poles of the planet. North becomes South and vice versa. The effects of this become clear when suddenly it becomes impossible to go outside without your skin turning black fom the lethal rays of the Sun entering the atmosphere. Life inside becomes difficult too and everyone dies, maybe the pole-shift is a bad thing after all.

5. Sun Dies
Suddenly and with little warning the Sun simply expires, burnt out. It gets very cold, very quickly. Not even the cockroaches will survive!

6. Earth sucked into a Black Hole
Oops where did that come from? The scientists never saw it because it was black and space is also black, black on black you see! Without warning every person on Earth sudeenly becomes 50 miles tall and 3mms wide. Don't worry, you won't even feel it!

7. Alien Invasion
Aliens arrive uninvited and start wiping us out because we're an embarassment to intelligent beings everywhere, or alternatively they show up all friendly like the ones in "V" and start shipping us back to their homeworld where their reptilian kinsman can devour us at their leisure, because human flesh is just so damn yummy!

8. Massive Sea-level rise
All the predictions on climate change go out the window as the ice-caps melt instantaneously (a particularly hot summer). The sea-level rises, a lot, and tsunamis obliterate everything. Maybe a couple goat-herds will survive, but without any mates and with just a few goats to eat, their time will also be relatively short.

9. Fabric of Space-Time Continuum torn asunder
Some "boffins" discover the means by which to travel back in time, which they then proceed to do, travelling back millions of years into the past. Unfortunately, one of them decides to pick a flower (a specimen to take back to the lab) and inadvetently kills a newt-like creature, which unfortunately is the sole-ancestor of all mankind. This creates a paradox and it becomes as though we had never been!

10. An act of God
God's had enough! He's not even bothered about saving the animals this time, we've already wiped out millions of species and would eventually finish off the remaining species. Think Sodom and Gomorrah, but on a Global scale.

Lottery Swindle!

For today's post I was planning to write a follow up to yesterday's post on the Illuminati plot to depopulate the planet, by expanding on the possible ways by which human life might cease to exist. Unfortunately, I will have to put this on the back-burner until tomorrow, because last night something inadvertently came to my attention, which I believe needs to be expounded upon herein.

I was washing the dishes (yes, I'm a 21st Century man) and the T.V. was on, although nobody was watching it as far as I'm aware. So, although I couldn't see the telly, I could hear it. The Lottery show was on, something which I would normally avoid like the plague, because it's so cheesy and... it's just awful really! Anyway, it's going on and I catch the presenter saying something very much like;

"Remember, all your money going to the good cause fund will be paying for the Olympic and Paralympic games!"

And, I'm thinking to myself "Did I just hear him correctly?" because he said "all your money". I know the Olympics are going to cost a fortune, but surely the Government should be paying for it. Well, it's obvious really, I'd already heard that the government was using lottery funds to pay for government sponsored projects under the guise of being "good causes", but this takes the biscuit! Firstly, all the good cause money is being channeled into London, when it's supposed to be distributed across the UK, and secondly it's now even more transparent why Richard Branson's Virgin company were turned down the opportunity of running the lottery.

Branson offered to run it for free with even more money going to good causes, but clearly such enterprises are only intended to operate as some sort of gigantic money laundering scam. There's no point coming up with an idea where the public are eager to pour in their cash for virtually no return, if you can't abuse it completely.

A second thing that was said on the show, once again made my thinking travel off on a tangent. The host said;

"I know it's going to be a busy night, but can you give me a time-check please?"

A omnipresent being responds;

"Yes, the time is almost 11 minutes past..." whatever, 8 I think he said.

I thought to myself "Why would they do that? Do they feel the need to demonstrate that the show is live, because in reality it isn't?" It just seemed like such a bizarre thing to do. Surely, if the show is in fact live, they wouldn't feel the need to prove it. Highly suspicious, I'm being to think the whole thing is run by mobsters!

Depopulation To Order!

Caught a little news tidbit this morning about how the Illuminati want to embark upon a program of depopulation (the resurgence of an old idea apparently). Not mainstream news obviously, who looks there anymore. If you want to know what's really going on then you have to Digg for it! However, do the Illuminati really exist, or is it just a term that's bandied around to describe the elite businessmen who really rule the World?

The real questions that need to be asked though, if you are to accept the statement given at face value, are:

• Why depopulate the World?
• Who lives, who dies?
• How seriously are they about depopulating the World? ... and
• What means do they have at their disposal to see through their dastardly plans?

Clearly there are several possible reasons for wanting to see a dramatic reduction in the global population; reducing carbon emissions dramatically, limiting or ceasing the spread of certain diseases, managing food and water stocks more efficiently, but possibly they are motivated by more wicked sentiments, such as racial superiority, intellectual superiority or desire for power and wealth. We all know which reasons are most likely!

It's true that the World's population is constantly increasing and is greater than ever before. In the past War and disease have curbed poulation rise, but now medicine and the nuclear deterrent held by the most powerful nations, have significantly reduced the possibility of either factor coming heavily into play.

So, how could a dramatic depopulation program be unleashed. Well, in all likelihood you wouldn't really know it was orchestrated anyway. The 2 factors I have identified as responsible for depopulation are the primary tools which could be used by evil powermongers to effect it. They could for instance instigate an incident which would draw the super-powers into armed conflict and the possibilty of nuclear strikes. Alternatively, they could unleash a deadly virus, creating a pandemic unlike any ever seen before. This is probably the most likely scenario, as it would be quite easy to make it seem like a natural catastrophe. For instance, if Avian Flu were to mutate to form a human strain, who would think that suspicious? Haven't they been warning us about just such a possibility?

There are some massive pharmecutical companies out there, who could potentially initiate a viral epidemic, with vaccines already in place. Let the epidemic take hold, then reveal that a vaccine is available, but expensive. Sell vaccinations to those who can afford them. Accumulate futher wealth and power, everyone will be so grateful, and who will care about all the poor people who died because they couldn't afford the vaccine. I know I'm sounding positively apocalyptic here and it's not in my nature to see the pessimistic side to anything, but I think I've demonstrated here how easy it would be, and rest assured there are innumerable people out there who would love to see it happen!

False Terror Flags!

You can't help wondering recently why the press and media in general are so ineffective in posing questions which must surely seem in need of answering, certainly from a public standpoint anyhow. Of course, since I was going on holiday, the attack at Glasgow airport definitely warranted cause for concern, but at the same time it occured to me that several things didn't add up. For instance, why were the main doors to the building accesible from the roadway in the first place? Even shopping centres and other buildings of relatively little importance have steel bollards to prevent access to vehicles. Surely they could have seen the potential was there, the attackers did!

Anyway, that's the least disturbing part. When the incident was reported initially, the news stated that US secret services had warned of a possible attack at Glasgow airport 2 weeks previously. Who did they warn exactly? Was it the UK government or UK secret services? Because, airport officials claimed that they certainly weren't told about it! Makes you wonder doesn't it? Nothing better than a terrorist attack to start off the holiday season and a new arrival in office at No.10. Indeed, even with the recent flooding and government failures in handling them, the papers today indicate that Labour have opened up a 8% lead on the Tories. Remarkable!

More Tales From the Veneto!

I may have to retract my previous statement that 50% of Lido de Jesolo was made up of Germans. As my father rightly pointed out, they were probably largely Austrian, especially given the close proximity of Austria to that area of Italy in particular. My father actually went a little further, suggesting that (in his experience) Austrians don't like being identified as Germans, in much the same way as a Scotsman wouldn't want to be identified as English.

Perhaps the strangest thing I saw on holiday, was young kids (say about 4 or 5 yers old) talking to their parents in German. It just doesn't seem natural, such a harsh sounding language being spoken by children. I found it very weird, but that's just a personal opinion, perhaps they would think the same about us.

Anyhow, the picture above is one I took of the entrance to the Gasoline Road Bar in Lido de Jesolo, at the Piazza Mazzini. Clearly a pair of hard-living peanuts! Oh, by the way, some odd stuff! We met with our holiday rep the day after arriving and were informed of the following necessary facts for holiday survival:

• Crossings on Italian roads are merely for show, although sometimes cars will stop, but rarely.
• Speed limits on Italian roads have no significance, they drive at whatever speed they feel like.
• Sudanese guys were selling fake designer handbags on the beach, getting caught handing over money for one could earn you a 1000 Euro fine.
• Littering could earn you a 500 Euro fine.
• Italians all carry ID cards (for security reasons?) and you could be asked to provide ID at anytime.

These were all valid points, and apart from the handbag statement which I wasn't going to try out, I saw all the others clearly demonstrated. They drive like maniacs, and if they see you on the crossing, they actually speed up so as to make you run for it. Like wise I frequently saw speeds of probably 70mph and upwards on a 30mph road. I was also aked for ID several times (completely unnecessarily in my opinion) such as when I changed some currency, and when I asked for a locker at Aqualandia, wtf?